Sign Up: Democracy Now! Daily Digest 02 May 2011

Democracy Now! Daily News Digest
May 2, 2011

Jeremy Scahill on Killing of Bin Laden: Obama Has “Doubled Down on Bush Administration Policy of Targeted Assassination” The manhunt for Osama bin Laden is over. Nearly 10 years after the attack on the World Trade Center and Pentagon, U.S. forces are said to have assassinated the Saudi-born founder of al-Qaeda inside Pakistan. We speak with Jeremy Scahill, the national security correspondent for The Nation magazine, who has followed the Iraq and Afghanistan conflicts closely as well as reported on the covert war inside Pakistan. Watch/Listen/Read

Talat Hamdani, Mother of 9/11 Victim: I Hope Death of Bin Laden Moves Country Toward Peace, Away from Revenge and Killing New York City Police Cadet Mohammed Salman Hamdani died on Sept. 11 after he raced to the Twin Towers to help survivors. We speak to his mother, a member of September 11 Families for Peaceful Tomorrows, about the killing of Osama bin Laden. Watch/Listen/Read

Did Pakistani Gov’t Know Where Osama bin Laden Was Hiding? "The idea that bin Laden got from Tora Bora to that house over the last seven or eight years without a single element of the Pakistani state knowing about it just doesn’t ring true," said Pakistani journalist Mosharraf Zaidi, who has been reporting in Abbottabad. Pakistani writer Tariq Ali questions how bin Laden could have been living inside a fortified compound within a mile of Pakistan’s premier military academy. Watch/Listen/Read

"One Killer Killing Another": Journalist and Activist Allan Nairn on Obama’s Targeted Killing of Bin Laden "Bin Laden is dead, but the world is still governed by bin Ladens. People cheer because they thought they saw justice, but this was not justice delivered by victims. This was one killer killing another,” says independent journalist and activist Allan Nairn. Watch/Listen/Read

Military Intelligence Analyst Joshua Foust: Death of Bin Laden Will Not Have Enormous Impact on Operations of Al-Qaeda Affiliates Worldwide In addition to Afghanistan, the United States is fighting al-Qaeda in the Arab Peninsula. We discuss the impact of Osama bin Laden’s death on al-Qaeda across the globe with Joshua Foust, a fellow at the American Security Project and former Defense Intelligence Agency analyst. Watch/Listen/Read

Ex-State Department Official Matthew Hoh: With Killing of Bin Laden, Why Are 50,000 U.S. Troops Still in Afghanistan? After two tours of duty in Iraq and serving in the State Department in Washington, D.C., Matthew Hoh became the United States’ senior civilian representative and political adviser in Afghanistan. He resigned five months into his contract, making him the highest-ranking U.S. government official to publicly quit over the war in Afghanistan. He joins us from Washington, D.C., to discuss whether the death of Osama bin Laden means the end of that war. Watch/Listen/Read

Today's Headlines U.S. Forces Kill Osama bin Laden in Pakistan Eleven People Killed as Taliban Announces Spring Offensive in Afghanistan Libya: Son of Gaddafi Killed in NATO Strike, Preschool for Down Syndrome Children Bombed Scores Killed in Syrian Security Crackdown, Hundreds Arrested in House Raids Yemen President Ali Abdullah Saleh Refuses to Sign Resignation Deal Israel Withholds $90 Million in Tax Revenue Owed to Palestinian Authority Left-Leaning Party Threatens Conservative Power in Canadian Election U.S. Tornado Death Toll Tops 350 Thousands Call for Immigrant and Labor Rights in Nationwide May Day Protests Egypt Celebrates International Workers’ Day for First Time Since 1952 San Francisco Newspaper Accuses Obama Administration of Intimidation Watch/Listen/Read